I recently had an idea for an art project that would represent everyone as light, the divine sacred mystery inside of each and every one of us. What if it exists and we need to choose and work to find it? When we do, it works to de-fragment us, to lead us to wholeness and authenticity, to peace.
It would be very difficult for me to represent that light in people who's actions suggest they are disconnected from love, nonviolence and justice. It would probably be extremely challenging for me to create likenesses of Hitler, Bin Laden, etc with light. It would probably make others angry at me for even suggesting the possibility. What if we are called to connect at that level of what makes us entirely equal, our divine spirit, distributed evenly? Yet even in our daily lives, we pass each other and sometimes don't even acknowledge the humanness of each other, much less the divine. What if we see each other as the "carriers of precious cargo" as Dr. Kerley puts it? What if we honor that in everyone we pass throughout our day? What if the characters that I'd have the most difficult time depicting as light had been acknowledged and related to in this vain? Would they have taken entirely different paths? What if they had loved and seen that in themselves? What would their enlightened passion and drive have turned towards? What if they had been taught to see it in every other person? To me, living in faith, is attempting to live out these questions by acting 'as if' each of these 'what ifs' matter. To me, living in this faith is a courageous opening of doors connecting what dwells within in us to what dwells within another. It seems obvious to me what happens when we don't act as if these matter. We are surrounded by the consequences of not living 'as if.'